Spotify's new update is very similar to something Apple is working on

The Stockholm-based streaming music company introduced
a host of new features to its app on Wednesday, including one
that delivers a personalized playlist based on a number of
factors, including the time of day, your age, gender, and
location, as well as what you have — and haven’t — listened to in
the past.

Spotify says that a team of editors also helps choose the music,
and the recommendations will get better over time as you listen
more.

If that sounds a bit familiar, it’s because using a combination
of data and artist curation to help you discover music is exactly
what Beats Music, the streaming music service founded by Dr. Dre
and Jimmy Iovine, played
up when it launched last year. Apple ended up buying Beats a
few months later for $3 billion and will use it as the backbone
for a new streaming service expected to debut as early as next
month.

When you sign up for Beats, you’re taken through a series of
steps that helps the service get to know your tastes. You choose
the type of music and artists and bands you like and don’t like.
You can also choose music by completing a sentence based on what
you feel like doing.

Helping people discover music is an idea that Jimmy Iovine, the
record producer and co-founder of Beats, has been talking about
for years.

"There's a sea of music out there but there's no curation for
it,"
Iovine told AllThingsD's Walt Mossberg in an interview in
2013. "It's all about what song comes next ... I guarantee
everyone here struggles to get music for the event or thing
they're doing at the moment.”

"We're trying to step in," Iovine told Mossberg. "We're going to
try to harness that and get people to listen to music in a
comfortable way."

This is how Beats Music
curates playlists.Beats
Music

That’s a sentiment that Daniel Ek, Spotify’s CEO, echoed
Wednesday. He discussed the difficulty in discovering what to
listen to, as fewer people go to record stores to build their
music collections and instead have access to millions of songs
wherever they go.

“If we truly want Spotify to be
the soundtrack of our lives … we needed to be able to deliver the
right music and experiences based on who we are, what we’re doing
and how we’re feeling — moment by moment, day by day.”

Iovine is now an Apple executive and reportedly deeply involved
in getting the new music streaming service together.

In an interview with Business Insider, Rochelle King, Spotify’s
global vice president of design and user experience, would not
comment on Apple’s rumored new service. In a statement, the
company said that “We think that the more players who enter the
streaming space will only grow the market and drive awareness.
We're focused on building out the best experience for music fans
and for artists.

But the company is clearly trying to differentiate itself from
other music services as the already competitive space is poised
to become even more competitive. Spotify also announced on
Wednesday that subscribers will now be able to watch short videos
from partners like Comedy Central and Vice, as well as listen to
podcasts, within the app.

Spotify's new "Now" music
discovery feature.Spotify

Spotify also unveiled a new feature for runners that
automatically detects an athlete’s tempo and matches music to the
“beat” of the run.

The idea is to keep subscribers, who pay $9.99 per month for
Spotify, in the Spotify world as much as possible, so they don't
have to close the app if they want to watch videos or listen to
podcasts. Because the more they use it, the more likely they are
to continue subscribing.

Unlike streaming video services, which license different movies,
TV shows and create their own programming, on-demand streaming
music services have, with a few notable exceptions, the same
music catalogues.

So in an increasingly competitive space, the only way these
services are going to be able to differentiate themselves is by
changing the experience.